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In Brasilianas, journalist Luis Nassif fires another quixotic broadside at his target of choice, Veja magazine — one of Brazil’s premiere newsweeklies, in circulation if not in epistemological lucidity.

He does so despite the remarkable volume of SLAPP suits he has endured for doing so.

From time to time, I have done Nassif the small favor — I hope he sees it that way — of translating portions of his close readings of this locomotive of rumor, slander and informal fallacy. From what I can see, the man has gone to great lengths to ensure that his arguments check out.

The chickens are coming home to roost with the current scandal over the involvement of a rightist federal senator and a leading racketeer, known colorfully as Charlie Waterfall.

Veja has sought to anticipate this criticism by running the transcript of a federal police wiretap in which numbers racketeer Carlinhos Cachoeira and the intelligence expert Jairo discuss Policarpo.

It points to a hand-picked phrase – ” Policarpo will never be our man” – to illustrate the Veja editor’s alleged independence from their lobbying group.

This obviously does nothing to relieve Veja of the pressure, however. Yes, Policarpo was not, in fact, Carlinhos Cachoeira’s man at Veja. He took orders from Roberto Civita and as such was the linchpin of a criminal conspiracy linking Cachoeira to the magazine’s ownership.

There will be do way of denying this collusion, not even if it comes to making Policarpo or Jairo or this Dadá fellow take the fall for it. The deal was entered into by the men in charge: Roberto Civita of Abril, and Cachoeira on behalf of his business group.

From the Terra news portal, further developments in the decline and fall of Senator Demóstenes Torres, this time published first in Globo’s Época weekly newsmagazine.

Senator Demóstenes Torres allegedly requested the assistance of racketeer Carlinhos Cachoeira in procuring World Cup contracts for a friend’s public relations firm in Mato Grosso.The charge was published today in Época magazine, based on telephone wiretaps by the Federal Police. The conversation allegedly took place on April 11, 2011, in which Torres asked for th help of “Charley Waterfall” to win a competitive contract …